Consortia SIG Meeting – Nov 1-2, 2012
The group reviewed the status of issues that have been raised from previous meetings in order to come up with topics for the discussion with SirsiDynix execs. Bill Davison, CEO; Berit Nelson, Vice President of Library Relations; John Perry, Director of Customer Support; and Ray Biscaro, Regional Sales Manager were all present for the meeting on November 2nd.
** The SirsiDynix response sections are our notes of what SirsiDynix staff said at the meeting. What we heard might not have been what SirsiDynix meant. We expect to get official answers, comments from the company.
I. General Comments
There are still several issues that have been problematic for a long time. Most notably: upgrades, Client Care, taking consortia into account in the development process.
However, the company has made a lot of progress in these areas—especially in the last 2 years.
SPP Process – Agreement that this is a great idea. This allows consortia to have input at the beginning of the development process.
Stability – There was consensus that the stability of the unix based system in Symphony is a big plus for SD.
Company Focus – there seems to be a pretty good balance of continuing development on existing products and new development.
II. Upgrade Comments and Questions
The consensus was that upgrades have continued to improve, and that they go very smoothly at the system level. However, there is still a need to improve the client upgrades for both the Horizon and Symphony ILS.
Steven Bowers from DALNET stated that some Horizon sites had to temporarily suspend plans to upgrade to the new version of the software because it caused the OPAC to “explode.”
CCS staff reported that the new option to upgrade the WorkFlows client via remote login had worked well for them during their last upgrade.
A suggestion was made that it would be a good idea to have some kind of a confirmation message at the end of the client upgrade to make staff aware that it has (or hasn’t) completed successfully.
Question: Is SD considering “environmental” issues with the development of the new Web Client? Are they applying lessons from recent WF and Horizon client upgrades to development of new platforms? (Michael Stallings – JLC)
Question: What does Platinum Services include? Can upgrades be done overnight or during library closures without this level of service or extra cost to the consortia?
SirsiDynix Responses Regarding Upgrades – Berit Nelson
Horizon ILS can now make use of Web Services, but this has changed the load for HIP. Berit explained that this is part of the challenge/reason for the “blow up” to the OPAC that was mentioned during our earlier discussion.
SD’s move to web-based clients is progressing and should further minimize problems with upgrades. Updates to browsers and new web browser software will still be an issue, but SD is hoping upgrades will still be smoother as a result of this transition.
Future client releases will provide an option to disable their method of delivery for the client software so that sites can use MSIs if desired.
Bookmyne moving to HTML5 and SirsiDynix plans to use this standard when developing the Web Client and other products as well in order to ensure that their software will be fully functional in different environments.
SD is still trying to motivate clients to moving services to their cloud based hosted solution.
Symphony 3.4.1 SP2 should be the last upgrade requiring administrative privileges.
After hours upgrades may be scheduled with Client Care at no additional cost for consortia that subscribe to Platinum Services, or special arrangements can be made for an additional cost. [Platinum Services can also include quarterly authority updates, discounts, 20 hours of consulting, and 30 seats in annual training. If your consortium is regularly using these services, it might be more cost effective to purchase Platinum Services].
Enterprise Upgrades – at this time SD is taking advantage of staffing worldwide so there might be after hours window for upgrade regardless of service contract (for now anyway).
III. Comments about Saas
SaaS sites seem really happy. Redundancy in the cloud a plus. Numbers seem to be increasing. Numbers are smaller for consortia though. Consortia ARE the hosted solution for our members (Richard Shurman).
SaaS moving to Amazon a bit of a concern with stability. There have been problems with Bibliocommons more downtime than locally hosted Symphony server (Richard Shurman, CCS).
SaaS – Suggestion to not place so much pressure on customers to go to the cloud. Security and accessibility issues. Very unlikely to purchase ANY cloud based products. (Michael Stallings, JLC)
SirsiDynix Responses Regarding Saas
Bill Davison stated that SirsiDynix is using the Amazon Cloud Based services internally, but none of their customers are on it at this time. They won’t move current SaaS customers over to it before making certain that it is extremely stable and reliable. Bill also mentioned that the possibility of hosting through Amazon Web Services might allow SD customers without test servers to affordably rent a test server instance for a brief amount of time.
Berit indicated that there will be a way for sites like JLC to take advantage of the new Web Client and other cloud based products without having to be hosted by SD in the future as the company is aware that this is a big issue for some customers.
IV. Comments about Support
There was general agreement that SD Client Care continues to improve in their level of service, however, support for more complex problems or issues sometimes can “linger” requiring multiple contacts, etc. to try to get them resolved. (Daniela Kroon, Traverse des Sioux).
Suggestion/comment: Cases are well vetted before they are created. Possibly consortia should be directed to a more tier 2 level of support (Ann Palomo, CLEVNET).
There was a comment that SD should think of the CC Support Dept as part of the Sales Dept. If interactions are consistently disappointing then customer is more likely to go elsewhere.
Another comment was made that SD Client Care is sometimes hesitant to be forthcoming with bad news, and that this can result in frustration as well as wasted time and effort on both sides. For example, if it looks like new server or other equipment is required in order to address a problem, then it is better to say that sooner rather than later.
Question: How does SD treat CC Staff? What metrics do they use to determine performance? (Karen Boehning, Winnefox).
Question : Does SD know that we are consortia when we file the case? (Ann Palomo, CLEVNET).
Question: How does the current CC support structure process requests from Consortia? How do they treat/classify them? (Richard Shurman, CCS)
Question: Do they read the notes in the CC profile? One site specifies that CC must get permission to login to the system, but when they get new CC person they often do not follow this requirement and simply login. (Debby Conrad, SAILS Inc.)
SirsiDynix Responses about Support – John Perry and Berit Nelson
John Perry stated that CC tries to flag people at the contact level to indicate if API trained, etc. Also, the narrative and other info should alert them about the fact that we represent a consortium. Additionally, if necessary customers can request to have a case escalated, and we should not hesitate to do this if we feel that it is appropriate.
The average tenure for customer support staff is 5.5 years. Positions have been expanded so that there is more opportunity to advance to management, etc., but often can start there and then go into other departments within the company as well.
CC has weekly meetings and lots of cross training. Scott Wheelhouse puts together a report that is compiled from customer survey responses to highlight how things are going (what is going well, needs work, etc).
Main focus is customer satisfaction (used in metrics for success).
There is a new satisfaction survey for library directors that will be sent out twice a year in order to get additional input on how the company is doing from outside of just the ILS contact.
CC has added some thresholds for new and existing cases. For example, each comment needs a response. If there is no response in a set time period, then an alert is sent to a supervisor and
follow up can be done.
Berit stated that SD is putting in place some better mechanisms for tracking customizations that they have put in place in order to ensure that these are not broken in the course of troubleshooting or updating software.
John Perry encouraged us to use the CC Support Portal to create new cases and he mentioned that they have some mechanisms in place to quickly route these cases to the appropriate staff. For priority one issues (down system, etc), you should still call for assistance.
V. Comments on Pricing
Inconsistency. Different pricing for libraries. Still seems like there is a lot of inconsistency with pricing. Would SD ever consider having some kind of special consortial pricing for new modules/products? Can they define consortial pricing? We would like to see more transparency with pricing. More information on how pricing is arrived at…is it circulation, number of libraries, etc.?
Need to have more detailed breakdown for both maintenance and new quotes. Consortia have to request second bill with itemized info. This shouldn’t be happening.
Long term contracts – can there be a solution for those entities that are unable to enter into one so that they are not punished for this inability. Some consortia get around the by signing a multi-year contract with a monetary consequence for non-renewal.
Suggestion to make more products one time purchase instead of annual subscription. Some agencies find this easier to justify or get funding. Maybe allow numerous years of the subscription could be prepaid (For example, if there is some extra money in the budget).
SirsiDynix Responses about Pricing—Bill Davison
All of the quotes are built off of a core formula with volume discounts that are built in. The public formula is based off of circulation, and the academic formula is based on the count of bibliographic records. Sales staff do have flexibility so we should make sure to go back to the sales people to talk about any concerns or issues that we might have with the quote.
Part of the lack of detail on the current SD invoices is due to the acquisition of numerous systems and products that have changed names or product codes. Bill will try to look into getting more of the details back in as the default.
Pre-paying multi-year maintenance should be an option. Just let your sales person know if this type of arrangement would be preferable.
VI. Comments about Product Development
Product Development for Horizon. Sites on Horizon are still treated as the “step-child.” Many products not available for them at the same time as Symphony, and in some cases they are not available at all.
Future Planning: Is there a planned end date for support for the Horizon ILS? Horizon sites want to know as well.
Social Library–SD didn’t seem to take consortia into consideration. Upgrades necessitate that data be re-entered. (Berit indicated that there will be an SPP for Social Library).
SirsiDynix Responses about Product Development
Bill Davison stated that there is no EOL for Horizon sites at this time, and he did acknowledge that this was a change in messaging from what the company has stated in the past. He also said that as things move forward with the development of the web client that Horizon customers could expect to see more products delivered at the same time as for those with the Symphony ILS.
VII. Enhancements: Process & Suggestions
Enhancements Process: It is moving forward. Joel Hahn and SD seem to have revived it. Seems a bit convoluted. How is the one vote per member enforced (honor system)? This is just maybe a question for Joel Hahn. We still wish that this process could be simplified more.
SirsiDynix Responses about Enhancements Process
Berit stated that SD will try to commit to 50% of approved enhancements in a release cycle, and that this round we will be picking 50 enhancements. We should also keep in mind that some of the enhancements will be implemented in the Web Client. It will be helpful to try to focus on the functionality of the enhancement request and not so much the details of which client (web or WF).
The COSUGI board made the decision to stick with the forums. Maybe talk to them about making the process more clear. SD has an enhancement tracking software after the voting.
Specific Enhancement suggestions
- Simplify the management of policies. We would like to be able to copy and do more global updates. Ability to output in .csv, make changes, and then put back in to more quickly effect changes.
- There was a strongly supported request to have a Policy Management SPP.
- Make delivered policy codes be bolded (or otherwise identified), and prevented from deletion.
- Need for Notices to be streamlined. Run once through the database, and then take that extract to generate the various notices that need to be generated. (Linda Scott Zaleski, CCS)
- Privacy issues for shared systems. Reports can be run on the shared database to retrieve data that perhaps should not be allowed. (Ghyslain Sabourin, Ontario Library System).
- Global Settings: Need more ability to make individual changes for libraries (both Horizon and Symphony).
These notes compiled and summarized by Shawn Andary and Karla Smith, vice-chair/chair-elect and chair of the COSUGI Consortia SIG, respectively.